Hallow's Faire in Love and War Page 4

  That voyage into Eastwind’s most dangerous territory with Donovan had been the start of so many problems. But if I got to do it all over again, would I change anything?

  My stomach leaped when the image of Donovan hovering over me on the cliffside in the deserted realm surfaced in my mind’s eye. That particular memory had been entirely off the menu as a matter of principle, yet there it was again, popping up at only the vaguest hint of deja vu…

  The tunnel narrowed, and Donovan’s hand brushed against mine.

  No, not Donovan’s. Oliver’s. “Sorry,” he said, hastily pulling the offending body part up against his body. “I don’t have great night vision. Gets me a little off balance.”

  The tunnels weren’t completely dark but as we followed Helena deeper underground, the torches along the walls were fewer and farther between.

  “Certain books prefer the darkness,” Helena said. “They like the light when they’re being written or read, but they do best when they’re stored out of sight.”

  “Why’s that?” I asked.

  She spared me a glance over her shoulder that was teeming with condescension. “How should I know? I’m not a book.”

  “She got you there,” said Grim.

  The tunnel split in a Y, but it was so dim that it was hard to see where the air ended and the wall began, and when Helena took the right path, I clipped my shoulder on the corner of the cavern. The walls were damp and cold. I didn’t know much about books, but I was pretty sure moisture was not kind to their paper.

  But then again, it turned out that some books were more complicated than I’d imagined. They had a preference for darkness and for moisture. Why not?

  Minutes later, when I was starting to doubt that Helena knew where she was going, she stopped at the entrance to a small chamber. This one, at least, had ample light. It wasn’t bright by any means, but it also didn’t require walking with my arms outstretched in front of me to make sure I didn’t run into the back of anyone.

  “Here we are,” she said, striding forward. “The book you described, if I remember correctly, should be right…” She leaned over, her back unnecessarily straight even as she did, and she walked nearly the entire length of a bookshelf before she finished with, “… here.”

  I was only vaguely aware that she had pulled it off the shelf and was bringing it to me. Because something else had snatched my attention and held on tight. Or rather, many somethings.

  The shelves of this chamber were jammed with all kinds of books… whose title or author I recognized. Stephen King, the Bronte sisters, even the Harry Potter series was there. Sure, these versions were leather bound, but the titles were all there. I picked a shelf at random and scanned. William Golding… William Goldman…

  But how?

  “What is it?” Oliver asked from where he and Helena stood at the center of the chamber.

  I was hardly able to string the words together. “These books…” Yep, couldn’t finish. The onslaught of the familiar was like a slap in the face after oversleeping. Perhaps there was still a part of me that believed this was all a dream, that when I woke up, I’d be back in Texas.

  Not that I was hoping for that, obviously. Tanner wasn’t in Texas, and I didn’t want to be anywhere he wasn’t.

  “Yes,” Helena said, “just ignore the titles. No one knows what they translate to, only that they all seem to be in the same language, hence shelving them together.”

  I whirled around. “What are you talking about? I can read them just fine.”

  “You can?” said Oliver and Helena with equal astonishment.

  “Of course.” I grabbed one. “This is The Princess Bride by William Goldman. Practically required reading. And this”—I grabbed another at random and examined the cover—“is Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. It’s also… well, actually, you probably don’t want to read it. I tried, and it’s not worth the effort.” I set it back on the shelf.

  Oliver and Helena were still gaping at me.

  “What? You really can’t read it?”

  Oliver shook his head. “You’re saying those titles are all from your world?”

  “Yep. As far as I know.”

  Oliver and Helena shared a pensive glance then seemed to come to the same conclusion. Helena spelled it out. “It must be your native language, then.”

  “English,” I corrected. “But there are a lot of books in English around Eastwind.”

  Oliver frowned sympathetically. “I don’t know what English is, but we don’t have it here.”

  I chuckled. “What are you talking about? It’s what we’ve been speaking this whole… Oh.” I snapped my mouth shut and the others were kind enough to allow me a moment to reassess. “There’s no England here, so there’s probably not English. Then… what language have I been speaking?”

  “It’s usually called the common tongue,” Oliver said. “But technically it’s Honorian. It’s only native to witches, but it’s become the official language of our realm and most of the others we know about. It’s even widely spoken in Avalon. The weres had their own language before the witches came, but nobody speaks it anymore. And the elves—”

  Helena jumped in to speak for her people. “We’re multilingual. But we speak Honorian whenever we’re around those other than our own kind. Elvish is sacred and we don’t like for those outside of our families to hear it.”

  I shocked even myself by how easily I rolled with this punch. The illogic of magic had truly worn me down when it came to questioning how things worked around Eastwind.

  And I had to say, it was kind of nice.

  Less “why is it like this?” and more “this is the way it is.”

  I scanned the shelves again. “Okay, if these are all books from my world, then that one…” Finally, I approached Helena to see the book she held in her hand. Part of me expected to be able to read it now. After all, everything in this room was English.

  But when I got close enough to see it in the firelight, I finished with, “… is not English. Whoa. What is that?”

  Helena handed me the heavy tome. “Enochian, I believe.”

  “And this is the title, right?” I pointed to the lettering on the front and Helena confirmed with a nod. “Okay, so what does it say?”

  She chuckled. “Not a clue. I don’t read Enochian. All I know is that in this sector of the library, there are hundreds, maybe even thousands of rooms like the one we’re in, each full of books in a language we can’t read, and each containing a single book, much like this one, written in Enochian.”

  There was obviously something to that, but if Helena, who’d worked at the library for decades (if not centuries), didn’t understand it, I likely wouldn’t put the pieces together in a single try.

  “If nobody understands it, then how do the books end up there? Someone must have understood and sorted them accordingly.”

  “Someone certainly must have. But it wasn’t me or the librarian before me, or the one before him, or the one before her. Considering we’re talking Enochian here, your best guess for an answer lies in someone who can read the language and decipher the book’s contents for you.”

  She fell silent, like she’d just given me an obvious hint, but I hadn’t a clue about who could speak Enochian. Were Enochs a thing?

  “And who in town speaks Enochian?” It was easier just to ask than to keep making stupid mental guesses.

  Helena raised an eyebrow at me like I was stupid, which I’d concede to her this time. “It’s the language of angels and demons.”

  “Oh.” Since I hadn’t encountered anything even remotely like a demon since Donovan and I had banished the Ba, I concluded there was only one person in town who could help me from here.

  I needed to meet with the sheriff.

  Chapter Six

  “Are you going to tell me what this is all about?” Oliver asked me once we were back in the main chamber of the Eastwind Library. Helena had already returned to her desk to continue looking unimpressed and ann
oyed at everything.

  The thick Enochian book was like a cinderblock in my bag, and I hitched the straps a little farther up my shoulder. Did Eastwind have chiropractors? I’d never had occasion to check, but if I was going to be lugging this monster around, I’d need one for sure.

  “Fine,” I said, stopping by an empty table. I set the load down on it. Was it smart to tell Oliver what was going on? It was anyone’s guess. But did it feel amazing to unburden myself of that anvil of a book? Yep. So it was worth it, I concluded.

  The ghost sitting at the table appeared perturbed by my invasion of his space, but considering the library ghosts had a habit of burying their noses so deep in a book that they walked straight through people (hitting the living person in the gut or back with the book as they did so), I didn’t feel especially bad about it.

  Oliver looked at me impatiently, his arms folded across his chest. For a moment, I forgot what I was going to say, because teacherly impatience was his best look. Just a hint of anxiety in his eyes, his jaw clenched, and an energy that said, “You’ll be in trouble if you don’t tell me, missy.” Hot-for-teacher was never my thing, but in that instant, I could see how it would be Zoe’s.

  Also, I’ve always found it a bit of a turn-on when a pushover takes a stand.

  I shook myself clear of it before Grim could get a whiff of any pheromones and never let me live it down. Then I said, “You’re not going to like it.”

  “Of course not.”

  I sighed. “Tanner’s parents visited this morning…”

  By the time I was done catching him up to speed, his arms hung loosely by his sides, and his mouth lulled open a crack. The anxiety in his eyes was still there, though. Stronger than ever.

  “So,” I concluded, “I want to take this book to Sheriff Bloom and see if she can translate some of it and help me figure out what I’m supposed to be doing.”

  He blinked rapidly, then nodded adamantly. “Yes, that sounds good.”

  “Do you mind if I skip our lessons?”

  “No! Please do! Good goddess, if nature’s balance is severely off, then… I don’t even want to think about it.” He nibbled on a fingernail and stared at the book where the cover peeked out of my bag. “Yeah, definitely go to Bloom for this. She’ll know what to do.”

  “Thanks.” I grabbed his shoulder firmly. “Why don’t you go spend a little time with Zoe? And maybe don’t tell her about this. The fewer people know, the better.”

  “Right, right. I could see how this might cause mass hysteria.”

  Of course he could. He looked like he was on the verge of it himself.

  “Let’s get a move on,” Grim said. “His smell of fear is overpowering.”

  For once, I did what my familiar suggested and parted ways with Oliver, heading straight for the Eastwind Sheriff’s Office.

  “Of course I have time for another one of your messy crises,” Sheriff Gabby Bloom said once I’d managed to snake past Jingo at the front desk and explain myself to her. Thankfully, I hadn’t needed to employ Grim’s diversionary urination services this time, but simply ignored the receptionist goblin and marched on through.

  I couldn’t tell if Bloom was being sarcastic, but I suspected she was. It was the mountains of paperwork around her that tipped me off. They’d only grown since I last paid her a visit. Context clues for the win.

  I suspected my “messy crises” had something to do with the recent growth. After all, writing a report on the doppelgängers or the archetype or Grace’s disappearance—all of which likely required a bit of circumventing the truth for the sake of official public records—likely took a bit of paper and a lot of time.

  That didn’t mean I felt bad asking for her help again. After all, it was her job, and I’d seen the way her face lit up every time she got to leave this recycling bin of an office.

  So, instead of apologizing, I said, “Great,” and pulled my heavy bag in front of me, reaching for the book.

  “Unfortunately,” Bloom said, “it’s my dinner time, and there’s nothing worse than a hungry avenging angel. Care to accompany me?”

  “Oh, sure,” I said, feeling caught on my heels. Part of me had assumed angels didn’t need to eat.

  As if reading my mind, she stood, stretched her giant white wings, and said, “We don’t need food to stay alive, but we’re not immune to how delicious it smells. Spend enough time down in a mortal realm, and you’re bound to give into the temptation sooner or later.” She breezed past me and grabbed her jacket from the rack, slinging it over her and adjusting the slits in the back to fit her wings comfortably. “Truth be told, I’m quite addicted to food now. If I go too long without it, it’s all I can think about.” She held open the door for me and I preceded her into the reception area, where Jingo and Grim were in a stare-off.

  The goblin had rolled up a copy of the Eastwind Watch and wielded it in his hand as he leaned over the desk, practically daring Grim to try something.

  “Excuse me,” Bloom said, her words slicing through the tension, “but what in Heaven’s name are you doing brandishing a newspaper like a weapon?”

  Jingo pointed a long finger toward Grim. “He lifted his leg. I know what he was about to do, and I’m not going to sit here and take it.”

  “Did not. I was just stretching.”

  “Stretching your hiking leg?”

  “Yes. I do it all the time.”

  “Liar.”

  Bloom snatched the newspaper from Jingo and said, “That’ll be enough. I’d hate for it to get out that the Sheriff’s Department is threatening witches’ familiars. The Watch would have a party with that, and what little progress we’ve made with the High Council would likely be blown to smithereens.”

  “In Jingo’s defense,” I said, “I’m pretty sure Grim was about to pee on the desk again.”

  “Traitor.”

  “Bad dog.”

  “You know I take that as a compliment.”

  The receptionist grumbled to himself as the three of us left and made for dinner.

  “Stews and Brews okay with you?” Bloom asked.

  “Of course.” The restaurant was delicious and just a little fancy. But what struck me most about the choice was that it was all the way on Fluke Mountain. Was she really hankering for a hearty stew, or did she have another reason for the long walk?

  “How many are there around you right now?” she asked.

  I’d almost forgotten that while the angel couldn’t see spirits when it wasn’t Halloween, she was extra sensitive to them.

  I had to pause to check. I was getting good at ignoring them. They spoke on a slightly different frequency as everyone else, so while the onslaught was so persistent, I could sort of tune it out like they were white noise. “Just two.”

  She nodded. “The Winds of Change sure are picking up.”

  It felt like fishing, and I wasn’t sure yet if I wanted to bite. “Yep.”

  “I haven’t felt them this strong in hundreds of years. Three hundred or so, actually.” I didn’t miss the sideways glance she snuck.

  “That’s what people keep saying.”

  “You know what happened three hundred years ago, right?”

  I did. The founding of Eastwind. The very bloody founding of Eastwind, where the witches took it from the weres. “Hold on,” I said, “you felt the Winds of Change three hundred years ago? I mean, I knew you were that old, but you were here for the war?”

  “Just the tail end of it. Once word of the long, bloody battles reached Heaven—”

  “Heaven?!”

  Bloom leaned back and peered down her nose at me, a slight hint of humor turning up the corner of her lips. “Yes. Where did you think angels came from?”

  “Well… I mean, in my old world, we always said they—you—came from Heaven, but I thought it was more metaphorical. To be honest, I thought you were more metaphorical. Then I came here and it turns out angels are real, along with a bunch of other weird things, so why wouldn’t Heaven be real? Obv
iously, it’s not a place in the clouds like everyone used to tell their kids—”

  “No,” said Bloom, “it sort of is a place in the clouds. At least all the portals to it are in the sky. And it’s often foggy there.” She shrugged a single shoulder.

  “Are you telling me Heaven is just another realm?”

  She nodded. “As is Hell.”

  My mouth might have fallen open at that, but I wouldn’t know because enough blood drained from my face that I couldn’t feel much of anything. “You mean like demons and the devil?”

  She nodded. “Yes, basically. But don’t worry, angels shut all the portals to Hell ages ago. It was item number one on our to-do list, so to speak. We tried letting them have it out with other realms, tried being more hands-off, but it wasn’t really a fair fight. They played dirty, as I’m sure you might expect. And all their evil deeds aside, they were simply too obnoxious to tolerate.” She leaned close like she was sharing a juicy secret. “They don’t have nostrils, so they’re always mouth breathing.”

  “I… would have assumed they didn’t need to breathe, actually.”

  “That’s the thing! They don’t need to! They mouth breathe solely because of how obnoxious it is to listen to.” She waved it off. “Don’t get me started on them. Just know that it’s much better off now that they’re locked away.”

  “Does that mean that everything demonic comes from the Hell realm?” I was thinking of the Ba, which Ruby had referred to loosely as a demon, among other things.

  “No, not at all. Evil can be created anywhere. But the most annoying evil? Yes, that’s mostly contained to Hell.” She shook her head. “You know everyone in Hell has a song stuck in their head? But not all of it. Just half of the chorus. And it stays with them until they die, those same few bars.” She shuddered. “No, everyone’s better off now that Hell is isolated.”

  I’d take her word for it.

  “Back up, though. You said you came in at the end of the last war?”

  “Right. Heaven sent me to help clean up the mess and sort out the guilty from the innocent. It’s always a muddy matter in war. Some people start out innocent and do guilty deeds. Some do evil the entire time but show no signs of guilt. By the time I arrived, the Winds of Change were already settling down, but they were still strong.”